2019 Perfect Game WWBA: Day 4 Notebook

JUPITER, Fla. — The fourth day of Jupiter is in the books, and heading into Championship Monday, just four teams are left standing: Scorpions Founders Club, Dirtbags, Padres Scout Team/ECB and the 2018 WWBA champions, Florida Burn 2020 Platinum. 

Those four teams will battle it out Monday morning for one of the most prestigious travel ball trophies in the country, while most of the field is heading home. 

On the draft side, after having conversations with major league scouts throughout the tournament two things appear clear: First, the 2020 draft class is very deep. It’s easy to say that with the contrast of a noticeably thin 2019 crop directly in the rearview mirror, but almost every scout posed the question agreed that this year’s prep class has exciting depth. 

Second, this year’s Perfect Game WWBA World Championship has less of the elite, top-of-the-class talent than most years. Of the top 10 players in the high school class, just one (No. 8 Blaze Jordan) was in attendance during this weekend’s tournament, which is unusual. It’s typical to see some of the top-of-the-class arms shut things down in October, but scouts did note that more of the high-end bats of the class decided to opt out as well. 

Perhaps that’s the function of a new summer schedule that includes an extended three and a half week PDP League in June that could have worn down many of the top players. That’s been a consistent theory posited around the fields at the Roger Dean Stadium complex this week. Perhaps it’s simply an outlier year.

Regardless of the cause, that simply means more under-the-radar prospects and players deeper down the rankings are getting more looks from evaluators. With that, here is our Day 4 Jupiter Notebook. Check below for our previous notebooks from the event.